Puzzle initials in red and blue with penwork decoration, with full (f. 7) or partial border (ff. 9v, 63) or pen-flourishing in red and blue at major textual divisions. Initials in red or blue with with pen-flourishing in the other colour. Paraphs in red or blue.

Dimensions in mm

230/5 x 155/60 (175 x 110/25)

Official foliation

ff. ii + 219 (+ 1 unfoliated paper flyleaf attached to a marbled endpaper at the beginning. f. i is a paper flyleaf attached to the marbled endpaper and f. ii is a bookplate pasted onto f. i. f. 1 is a paper leaf, ff. 2 and 219 are parchment flyleaves, formerly part of other manuscripts)

Form

Parchment codex

Binding

Post-1600. Brown leather with marbled end-papers.

Provenance

The earliest date in the manuscript is 1310, in a partially erased list of fees, 'Trinitiatis XIII Mo CCCX' (f. 218v).Flyleaf from a charter relating to Burghwasche (f.2v) in a hand of the second half of the 15th century. Hughes le dispenseur, partial inscription: '...nui Hughes le Dispenser le pier, lor fiz a la saint...' (f. 217v)William Kin, his inscription: 'Hic liber est meus/Testus est cleus [=clarus]/Si quis rogatur/William Kin' on f.218v, in a hand of c.1600.Edmund Hopkinson, High Sheriff of Gloucestershire (b. 1787, d.1869): his heraldic bookplate with the motto 'Once and Always' (f.ii). Alfred John Horwood, (b. 1821, d.1881), author, antiquary and barrister of the Middle Temple, London: his name inscribed on the inside front flyleaf and on f. 2; his sale, Sotheby's, 12 June 1883, lot 1294; bought by the British Museum

Notes

A list of contents in a 19th-century hand (old numbering ff. 1-421) has been inserted on a paper leaf (f.1). The contents include:ff. 7-9v, 102-106, Magna Carta in Latin and Anglo-Norman French;f. 112v, 'Comment le Rey d'Engleterre (Edward I) fist homage al Rei de Fraunce';ff. 117v-119v, Two collections of culinary recipes (found also in Royal 12 C xii, ff. 11-13, with a Middle English version in Additional 46919);ff. 122v-123, 'L'entrée d'Escose', dated June 1291, an act of recognition of Edward I as ruler of Scotland;ff. 124-131v, An abridged prose lapidary in Anglo-Norman;ff. 132-138v, 'Seneschaucie', an anonymous treatise on estate management and accounting;f. 150v-151, Explanation of weights and measures;ff. 152-217 'Registrum de cancellaria' or Registrum Brevium, the forms of writs in Chancery.Catchwords.

Select bibliography

Catalogue of Additions to the Manuscripts in the British Museum in the Years 1882-1887 (London: British Museum, 1889), pp. 30-32.

George R. Keiser, 'Practical Books for the Gentleman' in The Cambridge History of the Book in Britain, 6 vols (Cambridge: University Press, 1999-2011), III: 1400-1557, ed. by Lotte Hellinga and J. B. Trapp (1999), pp. 470-94 (p. 473).